evilneko:

I didn't say anything about Galileo.

I said you're in denial if you think religion has not had and/or does not continue to have negative effects on people.

A straw man arguement is purposefully misrepresenting the opponents position and then defeating that new position. Since you've made no arguements regarding what I said, I cannot be misrepresenting them since I put no words in your moth.

Actively acknowledging a common arguement against your side as the first point of discussion is a common and effective tactic in formal debating environments. And now you know.

And the phrase was "religion has a negative influence on people and is distracting people from knowledge?" Nobody actually said anything about negative effects.

And frankly, knowing something, even if it was a horrible, blatant lie, is still knowledge, so either nothing is distracting from knowledge or everything is. So for him to not be completely wrong or completely pointless in his statement, we need to infer some limiters, because if we take the statement plainly it is one of those things. Either just wrong, because religions promote plenty of knowledge, or pointless, because then it means "Religion isn't saying everything at once or nothing at all." And I hope the thread wasn't started for pointlessness.

So, starting from the end of his statement, we can see the "distracting from knowledge," but it's also promoting knowledge, so we have to infer that it is "distracting from the knowledge he thinks is important." Which is ok. Reasonable inference to expect people to make so that's ok left out. Which gets us to...

"religion has a negative influence on people and is distracting people from knowledge that I think is important."

But now that's not true in a different way, because not every religion is promoting the same knowledge, and there are definitely some that agree with him on almost every issue (if not all). So we need to be more specific again...

"Certain religion has a negative influence on people and is distracting people from knowledge that I think is important."

There we are, a cohesive statement, but now that we have a real statement to analyze, it's still rubish. I'm positive the specific things he thinks are important are scientific understanding, and at its worst, religion has not distracted from those things. Ever hear the phrase "any publicity is good publicity" before? I'm entirely positive there are more people interested in evolution and global warming than there would be without controversy around them. Everyone on this board is educated in a dozen different topics they might know nothing about had there not been a fight about it, and considering we're on the escapist, chances are good these debates have distracted us from video games, not scientific knowledge. That half the statement is just flatly wrong.

As far as "religion has a negative influence on people," that's not only contestable and relative, its also unverifiable unless you have coherent evidence that religious people as a whole have more ignorance or douchebaggery, and considering you tried to wrongly accuse me of a straw man arguement, I'll use some crappy inductive reaasoning and say your side isn't giving too good a showing right now.

BrassButtons:

By which they meant that anyone who read it should come away believing that the Copernican model was wrong.

Except they agreed to endorse (read: note allow, endorse) his work if he did a fair job.

Imagine the people who found the faster than light neutrino presented their work as comparison between their findings and Einstein's theories, except in satire with Einstein represented by a character named Simplicio. It doesn't matter what the authority is, they're not going to take it seriously.

j-e-f-f-e-r-s:

Galileo was arrested and tried for heresy.

And given house arrest where he could continue his studies freely and publish a way more influential work of physics anyway.

Rage19:

I cite the case of Galilieo and Heliocentrism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_Galilei#Controversy_over_heliocentrism

Excuse me, I already proactively debunked that arguement. Find something new.

"Earlier, Pope Urban VIII had personally asked Galileo to give arguments for and against heliocentrism in the book, and to be careful not to advocate heliocentrism. He made another request, that his own views on the matter be included in Galileo's book. Only the latter of those requests was fulfilled by Galileo. Whether unknowingly or deliberately, Simplicio, the defender of the Aristotelian Geocentric view in Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, was often caught in his own errors and sometimes came across as a fool."

And you can point out that he told him not to advocate, but that's still good science. Science experimentally supports ideas, it does not prove them.

tstorm823:

Excuse me, I already proactively debunked that arguement. Find something new.

"Earlier, Pope Urban VIII had personally asked Galileo to give arguments for and against heliocentrism in the book, and to be careful not to advocate heliocentrism. He made another request, that his own views on the matter be included in Galileo's book. Only the latter of those requests was fulfilled by Galileo. Whether unknowingly or deliberately, Simplicio, the defender of the Aristotelian Geocentric view in Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, was often caught in his own errors and sometimes came across as a fool."

And you can point out that he told him not to advocate, but that's still good science. Science experimentally supports ideas, it does not prove them.

Excuse me, you proactively debunked nothing, you just called Galileo a deuchebag and that's why he was punished, im gonna have call bullshit on that. How the fuck is being told not to advocate heliocentrism good science in the slightest whent he evidence Galilieo had suggested it? The Pope was quite clearly and delibrately making it look like he was giving consideration to other ideas, but wasn't really.

"Galileo was found "vehemently suspect of heresy", namely of having held the opinions that the Sun lies motionless at the centre of the universe, that the Earth is not at its centre and moves, and that one may hold and defend an opinion as probable after it has been declared contrary to Holy Scripture. He was required to "abjure, curse and detest" those opinions."

Science does prove ideas all the time, to say otherwise is ignorant and shows clear contempt for science, science has proven the Earth revolves around the sun, the existance of molecular structure and DNA, how electricity works, gravity and evolution, the list goes on and on. The object you used to post that comment is an example of proven science, the way a computer works isn't in the least theoretical, it's pure proven fact!

j-e-f-f-e-r-s:
*snip*

Just to toss more in stuff to help your argument; there are many many cases over history where knowledge can be lost.
Hua Tuo was the first Chinese doctor to use anesthesia during surgery, and his formula for it was lost. A great setback for Chinese medicine.
The records for the treasure fleets of the early Ming dynasty was destroyed, forever erasing any discoveries that they may have made.

Witty Name Here:

You can't say religion has not made great leaps in science. It's just plain wrong. It's like saying "America didn't start the war on terror. It's just the people who started it happen to be Americans." By that same logic of yours, Atheism has done nothing in the way of science either.

True. However, I can make a reasonable case that religion has also done a lot of damage to science over the years, and that in total it may have had a net negative effect on the development of science.
The destruction of the Muslim golden age by the religious leaders and the anti-evolution stance the religious followers have taken against evolution are two examples that immediately come to mind.
The second example is actually one of the most interesting because of it's time scale and amount of evidence. The anti-evolution thing has been going on for centuries (and shows no sign of ending) and evolution is probably the second most supported theory in the history of human kind after quantum mechanics. Evolution probably has more evidence going for it than any of the theories that allow us to have light when the sun goes away and for me to type this post.
So religion (like any other human-made organization) has done some good and some bad. Has it been a not positive or negative? I think arguments can be made for both. But I think the most damaging argument is one that is very difficult to measure, which is that religion has a tendency to allow people to stop questioning things. It has allowed people to use God to answer questions that they are unable or unwilling to seek answers for. I think that tips the scales against religion.

Rage19:

Science does prove ideas all the time, to say otherwise is ignorant and shows clear contempt for science, science has proven the Earth revolves around the sun, the existance of molecular structure and DNA, how electricity works, gravity and evolution, the list goes on and on. The object you used to post that comment is an example of proven science, the way a computer works isn't in the least theoretical, it's pure proven fact!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method

In the 20th century, a hypothetico-deductive model[9] for scientific method was formulated (for a more formal discussion, see below):

1. Use your experience: Consider the problem and try to make sense of it. Look for previous explanations. If this is a new problem to you, then move to step 2.
2. Form a conjecture: When nothing else is yet known, try to state an explanation, to someone else, or to your notebook.
3. Deduce a prediction from that explanation: If you assume 2 is true, what consequences follow?
4. Test: Look for the opposite of each consequence in order to disprove 2. It is a logical error to seek 3 directly as proof of 2. This error is called affirming the consequent.[10]

Note that this method can never absolutely verify (prove the truth of) 2. It can only falsify 2.[13] (This is what Einstein meant when he said, "No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong."[14])

Excuse me, sir. I believe this is checkmate. If this is not the moment where you reevaluate your understanding of science, then you are just being belligerent.

tstorm823:
le snip~

But you did put words in my mouth. My position the entire time has been that you are wrong if you are saying religion has had no ill effects on anyone. That certainly seems to be what you claim. Are you actually claiming that? Because it sure as hell seems that way. Shit, I even gave you the opportunity to clarify your position.

So let me just spell it out for you: religion has had, does have, and will continue to have negative effects on people. Not everyone, no, and I am not saying it is also without positive effects (see my first post in this thread).

Do I need to enumerate them for you? Clearly, I do. Let me start out broadly...

The persecution and killing of various groups, be they gays, "witches," blacks, "infidels," or just plain "not us" (And this is a huge catch-all, including acts of violence and oppression since the dawn of religion)
Cults that go off the deep end: Jim Jones, David Koresh.
Religion-addled parents denying medical attention to and/or abusing and even killing their children, or filling their heads with hate for the "not us" flavor of the month
Creationists spewing their misinformation (there they go, standing in the way of knowledge, hell trying to actively push progress backward)

All of these happen because of someone's religion. Someone, or some group, gets it in their head to do horrible things because "God said to." Even within the Christian Bible itself, you got people killing "because God said so." Even in my own life, my own family has suffered because my uncle was convinced "God told him" to do certain things. I'm just glad "God" didn't tell him to do something illegal and/or violent.

Fundies are fucking scary.

evilneko:

But you did put words in my mouth.

No, I never even close to implied that you were talking about Galileo. I just brought it up myself as an example of religion actually being a promoter of science. I chose that specific example as being most effective because it proactively undercuts the opposing arguers (see Rage's comment shortly after). As it turns out, side examples were not what you were interested in.

My position the entire time has been that you are wrong if you are saying religion has had no ill effects on anyone.

There, I think you got it, that's the straw man arguement. See, I never said anything like that at all, but you directly put that in my mouth and argued against it! I'm glad we had this lesson.

You see, refuting a statement is not the same as claiming the opposite. If you said Batman was a sprinter and I disagreed, I'm not claiming that Batman can't run. If you claim religion is a negative influence on people and I disagree, that doesn't mean I'm saying religion is universally positive. If nothing else, there is clearly the "no influence" and "can go either way" options.

Then again, nowhere in the statement I disagreed with is "negative effects," just "negative influence" and "distracting from knowledge."

That certainly seems to be what you claim. Are you actually claiming that? Because it sure as hell seems that way. Shit, I even gave you the opportunity to clarify your position.

Well, that's not what I'm claiming. I wouldn't claim religion has no negative effects on anyone. I wouldn't claim air and water have no negative effects on anyone either, so there's that.

I've snipped out the rest of your post since it seems you're not interested in having involved arguements about evidence that isn't directly related to what we've written, and I clearly am not claiming those things never happened.

Btw, I like the Rin you've got up now.

Pingieking:
snip

Actually the Muslim Golden Age wasn't destroyed by Religious Leaders, most scholars agree that it ended after the Mongols came and curb stomped most of the middle east. Baghdad used to be the center of the world, until the Mongols ravaged it so badly that people had trouble just finding the ruins of the place. In short, most of the muslim world stopped being a major contender for world power since the history of their downfall went: Mongol Invasion ---> Black Death ---> A Second Mongol Invasion. Add in the crusaders taking muslim knowledge and bringing it back to Europe and it's not much of a wonder most of the middle east is in the state it's in today...

And on your second point, while religious leaders have done some damage in regards to evolution. Most modern nations still require it to be taught in schools. So it's more angry grumbling then successfully destroying a scientific theory.

tstorm823:
Acceptable, sure.

It's flatly wrong, but you can say it.

This was the initial post of yours I responded to.

On the face of it I do not see any way to take it other than "religion definitely has no negative influences and never gets in the way of knowledge." I took it to mean exactly that. Previously you've neglected to clarify, even when I said this:

evilneko:

I didn't say anything about Galileo.

I said you're in denial if you think religion has not had and/or does not continue to have negative effects on people.

...which was a fairly unsubtle way of seeking confirmation that I understood your position. The response I expected was something along the lines of "No, that's not what I intended to say. What I actually believe is..."

I potholed Straw Man because Galileo had no bearing on the discussion between you and I, and I perceived your bringing him up as a possibly willful misrepresentation of my position.

It appears we may have the same position. Religion is neither wholly negative nor wholly positive.

However, I rather disagree with the idea of a lie being knowledge. I think it's hard to "know" a lie. One can believe it, but I can't draw a line between "know" and "lie" the way I can with "know" and "fact."

tstorm823:

Btw, I like the Rin you've got up now.

She's certainly a cutie.

Witty Name Here:

Pingieking:
snip

Actually the Muslim Golden Age wasn't destroyed by Religious Leaders, most scholars agree that it ended after the Mongols came and curb stomped most of the middle east. Baghdad used to be the center of the world, until the Mongols ravaged it so badly that people had trouble just finding the ruins of the place. In short, most of the muslim world stopped being a major contender for world power since the history of their downfall went: Mongol Invasion ---> Black Death ---> A Second Mongol Invasion. Add in the crusaders taking muslim knowledge and bringing it back to Europe and it's not much of a wonder most of the middle east is in the state it's in today...

While I don't dismiss the effect that the Mongols had on the region, I think a good argument can be made that religious leaders had a huge negative effect on Muslim science, particularly outside of areas that faced the Mongol threat. I already posted the example of Al-Ghazali, whose stance on mathematics in particular greatly hindered further development. Sciences in North Africa also stagnated without facing the Mongol threat.
In addition to that, science and technological advancement in the Orient was arguably accelerated due to the Mongol threat, so I don't fully buy the idea that the Mongols were the biggest factor in ending Muslim science. They certainly ended the Muslim political dominance in the region and dealt a serious blow to scientific development in the area, but I don't think they can account for the near complete collapse of Muslim science.

As for my second point, the idea wasn't that the religious leaders had destroyed it. The mere fact that they oppose it with such fervor is damaging enough. We've already seen someone post the data on the number of evolution believers. The fact that such a survey had been done means that religion has done more than enough damage to the field as a whole. Evolution has more evidence going for it than optics, gravity, and Maxwell's equations. It's got more supporting data and real life applications than the electron (the first application of evolution is older than any human civilization that still exists), but no one has ever (to my knowledge) done a credible survey of "Do you believe in the existence of electrons?" And electrons have been around only for about 100 years (compared to evolution's ~200 years) and is a less well known theory. How many hours has society wasted on debating a subject that, scientifically speaking, is about as much a done deal as possible? How many advancements have been held back in the field of biology due to the unreasonable attacked launched against it? How many people who could have contributed to the field were pushed into other ventures because of the conflict between science and religion in this area?

Pingieking:

Witty Name Here:

Pingieking:
snip

Actually the Muslim Golden Age wasn't destroyed by Religious Leaders, most scholars agree that it ended after the Mongols came and curb stomped most of the middle east. Baghdad used to be the center of the world, until the Mongols ravaged it so badly that people had trouble just finding the ruins of the place. In short, most of the muslim world stopped being a major contender for world power since the history of their downfall went: Mongol Invasion ---> Black Death ---> A Second Mongol Invasion. Add in the crusaders taking muslim knowledge and bringing it back to Europe and it's not much of a wonder most of the middle east is in the state it's in today...

While I don't dismiss the effect that the Mongols had on the region, I think a good argument can be made that religious leaders had a huge negative effect on Muslim science, particularly outside of areas that faced the Mongol threat. I already posted the example of Al-Ghazali, whose stance on mathematics in particular greatly hindered further development. Sciences in North Africa also stagnated without facing the Mongol threat.
In addition to that, science and technological advancement in the Orient was arguably accelerated due to the Mongol threat, so I don't fully buy the idea that the Mongols were the biggest factor in ending Muslim science. They certainly ended the Muslim political dominance in the region and dealt a serious blow to scientific development in the area, but I don't think they can account for the near complete collapse of Muslim science.

As for my second point, the idea wasn't that the religious leaders had destroyed it. The mere fact that they oppose it with such fervor is damaging enough. We've already seen someone post the data on the number of evolution believers. The fact that such a survey had been done means that religion has done more than enough damage to the field as a whole. Evolution has more evidence going for it than optics, gravity, and Maxwell's equations. It's got more supporting data and real life applications than the electron (the first application of evolution is older than any human civilization that still exists), but no one has ever (to my knowledge) done a credible survey of "Do you believe in the existence of electrons?" And electrons have been around only for about 100 years (compared to evolution's ~200 years) and is a less well known theory. How many hours has society wasted on debating a subject that, scientifically speaking, is about as much a done deal as possible? How many advancements have been held back in the field of biology due to the unreasonable attacked launched against it? How many people who could have contributed to the field were pushed into other ventures because of the conflict between science and religion in this area?

You make a good enough point on Al-Ghazali. However it really is a matter of circumstance when it comes to comparing mongol invasions of China and the Middle East. During Genghis Khan's invasion of China, it was left harmed, yes, but it was directly ruled and taxed and so avoided a great deal of raiding and razing. Plus I don't think the chinese kept the majority of their knowledge in a single place, unlike the Muslims in Baghdad.

And honestly, I think both Atheists and Theists (possibly Atheists especially) are responsible for evolution not being as widely accepted as it is. Personally, I'm one of those people who believe in Evolution with a God or divine being influencing it. After all, I find it greater evidence that Humans can adapt and evolve to survive virtually any and every situation nature throws at them as something an omnipotent and benevolent God would do rather then making Humans perfect "for the moment". While Church leaders protest evolution, Atheists have alienated some more moderate Theists by completely embracing the theory. There's a complete rejection that both a belief in God and a belief in evolution can coexist, and I know many theists would rather avoid the subject altogether then face the issue of being religious and supporting the "Atheist" cause of evolution and "threatening" your own beliefs. I mean, it would be like a Christian reading "The Gold Delusion" in the end the stresses it could make you go through, questioning and reaffirming your beliefs, just isn't worth the read.

evilneko:

tstorm823:
Acceptable, sure.

It's flatly wrong, but you can say it.

This was the initial post of yours I responded to.

On the face of it I do not see any way to take it other than "religion definitely has no negative influences and never gets in the way of knowledge." I took it to mean exactly that. Previously you've neglected to clarify, even when I said this:

evilneko:

I didn't say anything about Galileo.

I said you're in denial if you think religion has not had and/or does not continue to have negative effects on people.

...which was a fairly unsubtle way of seeking confirmation that I understood your position. The response I expected was something along the lines of "No, that's not what I intended to say. What I actually believe is..."

I potholed Straw Man because Galileo had no bearing on the discussion between you and I, and I perceived your bringing him up as a possibly willful misrepresentation of my position.

It appears we may have the same position. Religion is neither wholly negative nor wholly positive.

Well, you're initial response was calling me in denial, which I took as "that statement is correct and you just won't admit it." Which led to me talking about Galileo as an example of the idea of religion taking away from science being misinformation... and then eventually I forgot what we were talking about in the first place.

However, I rather disagree with the idea of a lie being knowledge. I think it's hard to "know" a lie. One can believe it, but I can't draw a line between "know" and "lie" the way I can with "know" and "fact."

Now that is a debate worth having. Cause I'm sure you know Harry Potter is friends with Ron and Hermione. That's knowledge, but knowledge of fiction. And what is the difference between knowing fiction and knowing a lie. Children know Santa Claus brings them presents. Is that not knowledge because it's wrong?

She's certainly a cutie.

And yet fits your name so well.

Witty Name Here:

And honestly, I think both Atheists and Theists (possibly Atheists especially) are responsible for evolution not being as widely accepted as it is. Personally, I'm one of those people who believe in Evolution with a God or divine being influencing it. After all, I find it greater evidence that Humans can adapt and evolve to survive virtually any and every situation nature throws at them as something an omnipotent and benevolent God would do rather then making Humans perfect "for the moment". While Church leaders protest evolution, Atheists have alienated some more moderate Theists by completely embracing the theory. There's a complete rejection that both a belief in God and a belief in evolution can coexist, and I know many theists would rather avoid the subject altogether then face the issue of being religious and supporting the "Atheist" cause of evolution and "threatening" your own beliefs. I mean, it would be like a Christian reading "The Gold Delusion" in the end the stresses it could make you go through, questioning and reaffirming your beliefs, just isn't worth the read.

I think we've reached a good conclusion on the Muslim science issue. :D

I actually hold the view that the belief of evolution with divine influence is very dangerous to science. I see that as part of the "God of the gaps" phenomenon that I've also seen in certain parts of astronomy. I find that particular view dangerous because it allows (and in some cases encourages) people to just say "God did it" rather than investigate further. Newton's work stagnated at around the same time that he declared that his investigations into the motion of the planets led him to marvel at God's ingenuity. I'm not certain if these two things were related, but I can certainly see the possibility of that.

In general, as long as someone doesn't use God as an excuse to stop questioning or investigating I am fine with it. But it makes me extremely uneasy to know that they do have that option lying around, or that such a stance may cause someone to subconsciously refrain from exploring as far into the unknown as they could.

As for atheists embracing the theory, I don't think they overdid it. There are certainly people who are very in-your-face about the issue, but I don't feel that the belief that God and evolution contradict each other is that radical a position to take. The interesting thing I find about this entire issue is that if you take both positions to their limits they actually converge. The mechanics of evolution is indisputable, but the underlying cause of those mechanics isn't really a scientific question. So we can actually have two explanation for natural selection; one side says it's divine and the other side says it's nothing. To me, that's a distinction in name only and has no real effect on the science itself.

The same applies to astrophysics and the creation of the universe (another subject where God and science has some trouble coexisting). I'm perfectly willing to accept the idea that God created the universe, as long as they concede the point that in this case, their God is scientifically indistinguishable from random chance. As long as we agree that God and random chance are two causes that would give identical results then I have no real problem with the theological view.

Witty Name Here:
And honestly, I think both Atheists and Theists (possibly Atheists especially) are responsible for evolution not being as widely accepted as it is. Personally, I'm one of those people who believe in Evolution with a God or divine being influencing it. After all, I find it greater evidence that Humans can adapt and evolve to survive virtually any and every situation nature throws at them as something an omnipotent and benevolent God would do rather then making Humans perfect "for the moment". While Church leaders protest evolution, Atheists have alienated some more moderate Theists by completely embracing the theory. There's a complete rejection that both a belief in God and a belief in evolution can coexist, and I know many theists would rather avoid the subject altogether then face the issue of being religious and supporting the "Atheist" cause of evolution and "threatening" your own beliefs. I mean, it would be like a Christian reading "The Gold Delusion" in the end the stresses it could make you go through, questioning and reaffirming your beliefs, just isn't worth the read.

I'd personally say that it's especially theists that took the radical stance, not atheists. Atheists just say 'I believe god doesn't exist' and 'evolution is true' separately most of the time. But theists look to their book, which says god did it. Therefore they oppose evolution because it goes against their holy book. Plus the mere knowledge that atheists believe in evolution no doubt helps this as well. Since I've already heard plenty of theists say 'they oppose god, their knowledge is wrong!' without actually knowing what the atheist in question knows.

tstorm823:

However, I rather disagree with the idea of a lie being knowledge. I think it's hard to "know" a lie. One can believe it, but I can't draw a line between "know" and "lie" the way I can with "know" and "fact."

Now that is a debate worth having. Cause I'm sure you know Harry Potter is friends with Ron and Hermione. That's knowledge, but knowledge of fiction. And what is the difference between knowing fiction and knowing a lie. Children know Santa Claus brings them presents. Is that not knowledge because it's wrong?

She's certainly a cutie.

And yet fits your name so well.

I would not consider it so, no. The difference between knowing fiction as you put it, and believing a lie, is that knowledge of a fictional story is not actually believed to exist in reality, and it can also be verified. I can read a Harry Potter book and discover that, within the context of this fictional world, Harry, Ron and Hermione are friends. Knowing that Harry Potter is a work of fiction, I also wouldn't expect to find Hogwart's anywhere.

Santa Claus on the other hand is believed to exist in reality by children and the childlike-at-heart. Unfortunately, this isn't Miracle on 34th Street and no such person truly exists. No matter how late I stay up on Christmas Eve, I won't catch a jolly red fat man climbing down my chimney. More likely, I'd discover Santa was Dad all along. Then I'd know Santa was a lie, and no longer believe in him.

Let's also try something else: electronics run on magic smoke. Heck, it's more plausible than Santa actually. Electronics often emit a wispy smoke when they fail, and electronics that have emitted such wispy smoke don't often work afterward. The magic smoke that makes them work has escaped, after all.

But if I told that to an engineer, he might groan at the bad joke but he'd also know that I didn't know a damn thing about electronics. Meanwhile I believe I know it all, despite having just proven I actually know nothing.

evilneko:

But if I told that to an engineer, he might groan at the bad joke but he'd also know that I didn't know a damn thing about electronics. Meanwhile I believe I know it all, despite having just proven I actually know nothing.

But still, is that knowing nothing or just knowing something wrong? If we were in the matrix, does that mean we know nothing because our entire existance is a lie?

The Bum:

Tipsy Giant:

Laws come from Morality, Morality does not come from religion, otherwise priests would be pillars of morality

Without religion what gives us morality? Certainly not instincts or empathy, that's contrary to natural selection. Your statement about priests is invalid as well, priests are still only human. Not all practice what they preach.

Your understanding of natural selection seems lacking. Due to the larger brain humans had to be born earlier and this caused them to need better protection and to be watched at all times, this caused the species to become societal and drove human natural selection in favour of altruism.

tstorm823:

BrassButtons:

By which they meant that anyone who read it should come away believing that the Copernican model was wrong.

Except they agreed to endorse (read: note allow, endorse) his work if he did a fair job.

Imagine the people who found the faster than light neutrino presented their work as comparison between their findings and Einstein's theories, except in satire with Einstein represented by a character named Simplicio. It doesn't matter what the authority is, they're not going to take it seriously.

j-e-f-f-e-r-s:

Galileo was arrested and tried for heresy.

And given house arrest where he could continue his studies freely and publish a way more influential work of physics anyway.

Rage19:

I cite the case of Galilieo and Heliocentrism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_Galilei#Controversy_over_heliocentrism

Excuse me, I already proactively debunked that arguement. Find something new.

"Earlier, Pope Urban VIII had personally asked Galileo to give arguments for and against heliocentrism in the book, and to be careful not to advocate heliocentrism. He made another request, that his own views on the matter be included in Galileo's book. Only the latter of those requests was fulfilled by Galileo. Whether unknowingly or deliberately, Simplicio, the defender of the Aristotelian Geocentric view in Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, was often caught in his own errors and sometimes came across as a fool."

And you can point out that he told him not to advocate, but that's still good science. Science experimentally supports ideas, it does not prove them.

How someone can be his misinformed about Galileo is completely beyond me.

Galileo was arrested and put on trial, because his theory was suspected of being an endorsement of Copernicus' idea that the planets move around the sun. Need I remind you that the Catholic Church banned Copernicus' works on planetary movement? Banned, as in, made illegal to print, publish or read. Why? Because despite the clear evidence that suggested that the planets orbit the sun, such as the movements of planets like Mars across the night sky, the Church believed that the Earth was the centre of the universe. because of this, they banned Copernicus' findings, and they tried Galileo for seemingly trying to advocate them.

That is not good science. That is called a totalitarian authority censoring the truth.

Galileo's published works were also banned, and he was not allowed to publish any new works according to the judgement of his trial, contrary to your claims otherwise. He was effectively silenced by the authorities, for no other reason than that he made claims counter to their own. Science does silence counter claims. Science welcomes them. Because only by testing theories against the theories and claims of others can we find out what is true and what is false. If the Church had truly been advocates of good science, as you so claim, they would have tried to bring credible evidence with which to challenge Galileo's theory. Instead, they claimed a thousand year old book as their proof, and silenced him for heresy. Galileo's Two New Sciences only got published in the Netherlands, where the authority of the Church was slim. Everywhere else it was either illegal to publish, or was rejected by publishers for fear of upsetting the Church.

It's also worth noting that they interrogated him, and threatened him with torture. Again, all because his scientific claims were different. And lest we forget, he was confined to his house for the rest of his life because of his views, views that we now know were correct for the time. Life under house arrest is no different to life in prison.

Your argument seems to boil down to "Well Galileo was a douchebag anyway, so he deserved to be arrested." It is that sort of attitude that allows for such large scale religious wrong doing in the first place. Galileo questioned the status quo, and tried to offer up an alternative view to society. No-one should be arrested for trying to open the minds of others, and the reaction of the Church shows how insidiously close-minded dogmatic religious organisations can be.

j-e-f-f-e-r-s:

How someone can be his misinformed about Galileo is completely beyond me.

Then it's strange that you are. ; p

Galileo was arrested and put on trial, because his theory was suspected of being an endorsement of Copernicus' idea that the planets move around the sun. Need I remind you that the Catholic Church banned Copernicus' works on planetary movement? Banned, as in, made illegal to print, publish or read. Why? Because despite the clear evidence that suggested that the planets orbit the sun, such as the movements of planets like Mars across the night sky, the Church believed that the Earth was the centre of the universe. because of this, they banned Copernicus' findings, and they tried Galileo for seemingly trying to advocate them.

The clear evidence that had not yet persuaded most astronomers? Is that the clear evidence you speak of?

That is not good science. That is called a totalitarian authority censoring the truth.

That they endorsed until he was a douchebag. See, I know we both read wikipedia, so I'll point you at this...

Galileo was always making himself unpopular with influential people, for he had a brilliant and caustic wit and he could not resist using that wit to make jackasses -- and therefore bitter enemies -- of those who disagreed with him. Even as a college student, he had been nicknamed "the wrangler" because of his argumentativeness.|Issac Asimov

At any rate, good science doesn't move quickly. Millenia of natural understanding including the traditional greek philosophical viewpoint should not flipped on its head from the studies of a small handful of people in a few years. There needs to be time (probably decades or centuries) of studies to overturn something that well established.

I know the negative consequences are less obvious, but lets compare it to the people claiming vaccines cause autism. I'm sure they have statistics to try and back themselves up, no matter how wrong they are. If they aren't causing mischief, there's no problem. People will take a look at what they have and find out if it holds up or not. If they are causing mischief, you condemn them for intentionally terrifying people away from the truth, right? Well, Galileo was causing mischief. He was taking his claims that were not widely supported at the time, and saying that everyone who disagres is an idiot. To that, good science says "shut up and go away."

Galileo's published works were also banned, and he was not allowed to publish any new works according to the judgement of his trial, contrary to your claims otherwise. He was effectively silenced by the authorities, for no other reason than that he made claims counter to their own. Science does silence counter claims. Science welcomes them. Because only by testing theories against the theories and claims of others can we find out what is true and what is false. If the Church had truly been advocates of good science, as you so claim, they would have tried to bring credible evidence with which to challenge Galileo's theory. Instead, they claimed a thousand year old book as their proof, and silenced him for heresy. Galileo's Two New Sciences only got published in the Netherlands, where the authority of the Church was slim. Everywhere else it was either illegal to publish, or was rejected by publishers for fear of upsetting the Church.

And if the Church harshly censored his work, how do you suppose the Copernican model became popular with him being credited. If the Netherlands is the only place his book was published and nobody else got it, how do you imagine it got spread everywhere and got him credited as the father of modern science? You can say all you want that the Church got in the way of science, but you're wrong because clearly the science got through easily enough.

It's also worth noting that they interrogated him, and threatened him with torture. Again, all because his scientific claims were different. And lest we forget, he was confined to his house for the rest of his life because of his views, views that we now know were correct for the time. Life under house arrest is no different to life in prison.

They asked him questions, said mean things because he was lying to their face, and then let him live his life in a comfy villa where he recieved prominent visiters for the rest of his life? Can I be a heretic too? And you know, it wouldn't have been difficult to run away to freedom. He was a devout Catholic and submitted to their authority voluntarily.

Your argument seems to boil down to "Well Galileo was a douchebag anyway, so he deserved to be arrested." It is that sort of attitude that allows for such large scale religious wrong doing in the first place. Galileo questioned the status quo, and tried to offer up an alternative view to society. No-one should be arrested for trying to open the minds of others, and the reaction of the Church shows how insidiously close-minded dogmatic religious organisations can be.

Except they supported him offering the alternative view. The Jesuits endorsed his alternative view. They arrested him once he acted like a douchebag. Your reaction shows how rediculously biased you can be where you see acting on religion as more insidious than being a douchebag.

I may prefer religious people over atheists, but I definitely prefer nice people in either categories over douchebags.

tstorm823:

evilneko:

But if I told that to an engineer, he might groan at the bad joke but he'd also know that I didn't know a damn thing about electronics. Meanwhile I believe I know it all, despite having just proven I actually know nothing.

But still, is that knowing nothing or just knowing something wrong? If we were in the matrix, does that mean we know nothing because our entire existance is a lie?

Well in that case, it'd be the same as knowledge of a fiction, except we'd be Harry, Ron, and Hermione. We'd be fictional characters in a fictional universe, knowing what the author (or machines) wants us to know. Fictional characters can be said to have knowledge of their own fictional universes. Commander Shepard knew the Reapers were coming.

Just out of curiosity I looked up the dictionary definition of knowledge. It seems dictionary.com is closest to my position, Webster's is unambiguously yours, and Oxford...leaves some room for interpretation.

I still hold though that one cannot know a falsehood. I can believe all I want that there's an invisible dragon in my garage, I can even claim to know that there is such a thing. In truth though I've just convinced myself that it's there, it's merely a belief. If someone proved to me that there wasn't a dragon, wouldn't I feel silly to have believed that there was?

tstorm823:

Galileo was arrested and put on trial, because his theory was suspected of being an endorsement of Copernicus' idea that the planets move around the sun. Need I remind you that the Catholic Church banned Copernicus' works on planetary movement? Banned, as in, made illegal to print, publish or read. Why? Because despite the clear evidence that suggested that the planets orbit the sun, such as the movements of planets like Mars across the night sky, the Church believed that the Earth was the centre of the universe. because of this, they banned Copernicus' findings, and they tried Galileo for seemingly trying to advocate them.

The clear evidence that had not yet persuaded most astronomers? Is that the clear evidence you speak of?

Go out tonight and look at the night sky. Find and observe the planets that we can see from Earth, such as Mars and Venus.

If you observe their motion across the sky across a period of months, you notice something very strange. They don't go across the sky in a straight line. In fact, they actually loop back on themselves for a bit, then progress onwards on their original course. People were observing this phenomenon thousands of years ago, and ascribing all sorts of mystical reasons behind it. Some cultures thought these wandering lights were mischievous spirits, others thought they were gods.

The actual reason is that the outer planets of the solar system orbit a larger diameter than the Earth around the Sun. Periodically the Earth, on its shorter orbit, will overtake one of the outer planets around the sun, so that it appears as if the planet is moving backwards across the sky. The outer planet then progresses further on its orbit, and continues to move in its original direction across the sky. In an Earth-centric solar system, these double-backs wouldn't occur: everything would move in a straight line across the sky.

That means that you can go out and observe, with the naked eye, demonstratable proof that the Earth is not the centre of the Solar System. Copernicus worked this out. This is that the Copernican model is based on. The fact that it took hundreds of years to take off is because the Church banned it. Why is this so hard for you to understand.

Also, a point of historical note: Astronomers didn't exist in the time of Copenricus and Galileo. Astrologers did. Think about that for a second...

That is not good science. That is called a totalitarian authority censoring the truth.

That they endorsed until he was a douchebag. See, I know we both read wikipedia, so I'll point you at this...

Galileo was always making himself unpopular with influential people, for he had a brilliant and caustic wit and he could not resist using that wit to make jackasses -- and therefore bitter enemies -- of those who disagreed with him. Even as a college student, he had been nicknamed "the wrangler" because of his argumentativeness.|Issac Asimov

At any rate, good science doesn't move quickly. Millenia of natural understanding including the traditional greek philosophical viewpoint should not flipped on its head from the studies of a small handful of people in a few years. There needs to be time (probably decades or centuries) of studies to overturn something that well established.

Guess what? being a douchebag isn't a criminal offence!

Moreover, what you described wasn't douchebag behaviour. Argumentativeness is a good quality among scientists, because it stimulates, provokes and encourages debate, one of the basic foundation blocks of the scientific method.

Once again, you seem to be encouraging the arrest and trial of someone simply because you don't like their behaviour, not because of any crime they've actually done. That is a shocking outlook to have, and it doesn't surprise me that you seem to so vehemently defend the Catholic Church of all people in their oppression of scientific ideas.

Also, science does not move slowly. It has only done so in the past because the Church has kicked its feet at so many historical scientific advancements.

You want proof that science moves quickly? Look at the entirety of the 20th Century. At the start, we had only just discovered how to use electricity. We hadn't even invented airoplanes yet. Most people were still using horse and carts to get round. By the 20s, we were using planes as part of aerial warefare. By the 60s, we were placing men on the moon. By the end of the century, we had incredibly intricate, huge space stations and telescopes in orbit over out planet.

The 20th Century stands as proof that scientific advance need not be slow. Relativity as a theory was invented only 60-70 years ago, and has become fundamental to our understanding of the universe. Yet there are now already signs that Relativity is an incomplete theory, and that we need to create a new model which better allows for our increased understanding of quantum theory.

Funnily enough, the 20th Century was also the beginning of the greatest era of secularism that the Western world had ever seen. It's almost as if, once you remove dogmatic religious authorites from power, scientific advancement is allowed to increase at its own pace.

I know the negative consequences are less obvious, but lets compare it to the people claiming vaccines cause autism. I'm sure they have statistics to try and back themselves up, no matter how wrong they are. If they aren't causing mischief, there's no problem. People will take a look at what they have and find out if it holds up or not. If they are causing mischief, you condemn them for intentionally terrifying people away from the truth, right? Well, Galileo was causing mischief. He was taking his claims that were not widely supported at the time, and saying that everyone who disagres is an idiot. To that, good science says "shut up and go away."

Except that he had proof that he was indeed right. Not just statistic, he had years and years worth of data and evidence. He had the very evidence I described above, which you can see with your own eyes!

Deriding Galileo is one thing. Trying to justify the Church's imprisonment of him is another, and I find it despicable.

Galileo's published works were also banned, and he was not allowed to publish any new works according to the judgement of his trial, contrary to your claims otherwise. He was effectively silenced by the authorities, for no other reason than that he made claims counter to their own. Science does silence counter claims. Science welcomes them. Because only by testing theories against the theories and claims of others can we find out what is true and what is false. If the Church had truly been advocates of good science, as you so claim, they would have tried to bring credible evidence with which to challenge Galileo's theory. Instead, they claimed a thousand year old book as their proof, and silenced him for heresy. Galileo's Two New Sciences only got published in the Netherlands, where the authority of the Church was slim. Everywhere else it was either illegal to publish, or was rejected by publishers for fear of upsetting the Church.

And if the Church harshly censored his work, how do you suppose the Copernican model became popular with him being credited. If the Netherlands is the only place his book was published and nobody else got it, how do you imagine it got spread everywhere and got him credited as the father of modern science? You can say all you want that the Church got in the way of science, but you're wrong because clearly the science got through easily enough.

Contraband. Ban a book, and an illegal trade will rise up to print it and supply it to readers. Funnily enough, even during Galileo's time, there was an avid demand among scientists to read the scientific papers banned by the Church, meaning the works of Copernicus and others were printed and smuggled into scientific communities to be read and analysed.

The fact that the idea spread anyway doesn't justify the Church for trying to stamp it out. You wouldn't defend the US government for trying to counteract the Civil Rights movement would you?

It's also worth noting that they interrogated him, and threatened him with torture. Again, all because his scientific claims were different. And lest we forget, he was confined to his house for the rest of his life because of his views, views that we now know were correct for the time. Life under house arrest is no different to life in prison.

They asked him questions, said mean things because he was lying to their face, and then let him live his life in a comfy villa where he recieved prominent visiters for the rest of his life? Can I be a heretic too? And you know, it wouldn't have been difficult to run away to freedom. He was a devout Catholic and submitted to their authority voluntarily.

They deprived him of his liberty. Simply because they didn't like what he said. That isthe textbook definition of a totalitarian authority.

And where does it say he lied to them? Were his lies as big as their claims that the Earth was the centre of the universe, despite proof of the contrary?

Your argument seems to boil down to "Well Galileo was a douchebag anyway, so he deserved to be arrested." It is that sort of attitude that allows for such large scale religious wrong doing in the first place. Galileo questioned the status quo, and tried to offer up an alternative view to society. No-one should be arrested for trying to open the minds of others, and the reaction of the Church shows how insidiously close-minded dogmatic religious organisations can be.

Except they supported him offering the alternative view. The Jesuits endorsed his alternative view. They arrested him once he acted like a douchebag. Your reaction shows how rediculously biased you can be where you see acting on religion as more insidious than being a douchebag.

I may prefer religious people over atheists, but I definitely prefer nice people in either categories over douchebags.

And I prefer a society which doesn't arrest people based on the subjective claim of how much of a 'douchebag' someone is. Your own posts have shown just how loose that description is, and the thought of people being arrested based on the judgement of similar preconceptions makes me shudder.

Blablahb:

I don't see where you got that bit about science. There's resistance to radical new theories, but if backed by facts, they can still cause entire paradigm shifts.

I also question the comparison. Lying to people to try and discourage them from getting healthcare causes diseases and likely even deaths. Proposing a new model about the galaxy has no consequences outside the scientific community.

You already assumed that those people know they're wrong and are maliciously spreading lies. They actually think they're right and helping children...

j-e-f-f-e-r-s:

Go out tonight and look at the night sky. Find and observe the planets that we can see from Earth, such as Mars and Venus.

If you observe their motion across the sky across a period of months, you notice something very strange. They don't go across the sky in a straight line. In fact, they actually loop back on themselves for a bit, then progress onwards on their original course. People were observing this phenomenon thousands of years ago, and ascribing all sorts of mystical reasons behind it. Some cultures thought these wandering lights were mischievous spirits, others thought they were gods.

The actual reason is that the outer planets of the solar system orbit a larger diameter than the Earth around the Sun. Periodically the Earth, on its shorter orbit, will overtake one of the outer planets around the sun, so that it appears as if the planet is moving backwards across the sky. The outer planet then progresses further on its orbit, and continues to move in its original direction across the sky. In an Earth-centric solar system, these double-backs wouldn't occur: everything would move in a straight line across the sky.

That means that you can go out and observe, with the naked eye, demonstratable proof that the Earth is not the centre of the Solar System. Copernicus worked this out. This is that the Copernican model is based on. The fact that it took hundreds of years to take off is because the Church banned it. Why is this so hard for you to understand.

Did you know that motion is relative to the frame of reference of the observer, thus the motions of the planets actually prove nothing about the motion of the earth relative to the sun, only that the other planets don't move evenly around the earth. Unless you can find the absolute reference plane, you are making HUGE leaps and assumptions that people hadn't made at that time to reach the heliocentric conclusion. It's not so obvious as you seem to think.

Also, a point of historical note: Astronomers didn't exist in the time of Copenricus and Galileo. Astrologers did. Think about that for a second...

Fair enough.

Guess what? being a douchebag isn't a criminal offence!

Moreover, what you described wasn't douchebag behaviour. Argumentativeness is a good quality among scientists, because it stimulates, provokes and encourages debate, one of the basic foundation blocks of the scientific method.

Calling someone stupid isn't arguementative, it's childish. Though maybe this explains how you act here...

Once again, you seem to be encouraging the arrest and trial of someone simply because you don't like their behaviour, not because of any crime they've actually done. That is a shocking outlook to have, and it doesn't surprise me that you seem to so vehemently defend the Catholic Church of all people in their oppression of scientific ideas.

You know, they didn't arrest him. They told him to go to Rome, and he showed up 6 months later.

Now I ignore a bunch of rubbish from you.

Except that he had proof that he was indeed right. Not just statistic, he had years and years worth of data and evidence. He had the very evidence I described above, which you can see with your own eyes!

Deriding Galileo is one thing. Trying to justify the Church's imprisonment of him is another, and I find it despicable.

Don't make me go on my proof rant. I already made one person feel bad about themselves in the last 24 hours. Science NEVER proves. NEVER. EVER EVER EVER EVER.

They deprived him of his liberty. Simply because they didn't like what he said. That isthe textbook definition of a totalitarian authority.

He submitted to their authority. He was Catholic and accepted the decision voluntary. You know what was going on at the time? The Protestant Reformation. He didn't live his life in seclusion because the Church said so. He lived his life the way they said to because he wanted to remain a part of the Church. Do what we want or you're not in our club anymore is not totalitarian authority.

And where does it say he lied to them? Were his lies as big as their claims that the Earth was the centre of the universe, despite proof of the contrary?

The threat of torture was not because he refused to recant his belief in heliocentrism. It was because he denied believing it. When they interrogated him, he said that he believed in geocentrism and wouldn't admit otherwise. They knew he was lieing to their face, but he refused to admit his beliefs because he wanted to be in their Church.

Except they supported him offering the alternative view. The Jesuits endorsed his alternative view. They arrested him once he acted like a douchebag. Your reaction shows how rediculously biased you can be where you see acting on religion as more insidious than being a douchebag.

I may prefer religious people over atheists, but I definitely prefer nice people in either categories over douchebags.

And I prefer a society which doesn't arrest people based on the subjective claim of how much of a 'douchebag' someone is. Your own posts have shown just how loose that description is, and the thought of people being arrested based on the judgement of similar preconceptions makes me shudder.[/quote]

They didn't arrest him... go think about that.

tstorm823:

Did you know that motion is relative to the frame of reference of the observer, thus the motions of the planets actually prove nothing about the motion of the earth relative to the sun, only that the other planets don't move evenly around the earth. Unless you can find the absolute reference plane, you are making HUGE leaps and assumptions that people hadn't made at that time to reach the heliocentric conclusion. It's not so obvious as you seem to think.

Hmm... allow Professor Sagan to educate you a bit.

Nothing else I can really add. Heliocrentric theory was a natural conclusion drawn from the evidence, and the fact it took so long to get going is thanks to the Church trying to quash it at every turn.

Guess what? being a douchebag isn't a criminal offence!

Moreover, what you described wasn't douchebag behaviour. Argumentativeness is a good quality among scientists, because it stimulates, provokes and encourages debate, one of the basic foundation blocks of the scientific method.

Calling someone stupid isn't arguementative, it's childish. Though maybe this explains how you act here...

Oh, touche. I bow to your merciless wit.

Except that by using such caustic wit, you're now using the same argumentative style that Galileo did. If Galileo was a douchebag, and I'm also a douchebag, for arguing in such a style, does that mean you're now a douchebag too?

Once again, you seem to be encouraging the arrest and trial of someone simply because you don't like their behaviour, not because of any crime they've actually done. That is a shocking outlook to have, and it doesn't surprise me that you seem to so vehemently defend the Catholic Church of all people in their oppression of scientific ideas.

You know, they didn't arrest him. They told him to go to Rome, and he showed up 6 months later.

And considering their word was law, I'd rather not think about what would have happened to Galileo if he'd outright refused. I imagine the phrase would sound rather like "Turn him at the cake!"

Now I ignore a bunch of rubbish from you.

Argh! The caustic wit! It burns. IT BURNS! Douchebag behaviour! Douchebag behaviour!

Except that he had proof that he was indeed right. Not just statistic, he had years and years worth of data and evidence. He had the very evidence I described above, which you can see with your own eyes!

Deriding Galileo is one thing. Trying to justify the Church's imprisonment of him is another, and I find it despicable.

Don't make me go on my proof rant. I already made one person feel bad about themselves in the last 24 hours. Science NEVER proves. NEVER. EVER EVER EVER EVER.

You live in a house, yes? Supplied with electricity, water plumbing, gas pipes? You're currently using the internet, and are therefore connected to the rest of the world through your phone line. If you use a car, it'll have a combustion engine which provides momentum. I imagine you'll have a television and radio in your house somewhere.

Your life is full of devices and inventions such as these. They are tools and inventions created by humans, based on scientific truths that we have proven!

This bullshit you keep spouting that science never proves anything is just that: bullshit! We send and receive radio waves on a daily basis. That's based on the discovery of proof that it is possible to send and receive such waves. We use mains electricity to power all our appliances. That is based on the scientific proof that it is possible to use electricity as an energy source for such appliances. We fly in planes around the world. That is based on scientific proof on how airflow and aerodynamics work in physics. The entire field of animal husbandry is the idea of breeding desirable traits in animals, whether they be dogs, pigs or cattle. The entire field of artificial selection would not exist without proof of evolution and how it works.

Science does prove, it has proven, and it will continue to prove in the future. The moon exerts a gravitational force on the oceans. We've proved that! Birds are descended from reptiles. We've proven that! I suggest you get your head out of a certain orifice, look around you, and take in the fact that the entire modern world is built upon scientific proofs. We would not have skyscrapers, supersonic jets, cars or the internet if we did not have proofs to build them on.

They deprived him of his liberty. Simply because they didn't like what he said. That isthe textbook definition of a totalitarian authority.

He submitted to their authority. He was Catholic and accepted the decision voluntary. You know what was going on at the time? The Protestant Reformation. He didn't live his life in seclusion because the Church said so. He lived his life the way they said to because he wanted to remain a part of the Church. Do what we want or you're not in our club anymore is not totalitarian authority.

Yet it still shows the negative influence of dogmatic religion, the very thing I was arguing against, and which you have tried to side-step entirely.

And where does it say he lied to them? Were his lies as big as their claims that the Earth was the centre of the universe, despite proof of the contrary?

The threat of torture was not because he refused to recant his belief in heliocentrism. It was because he denied believing it. When they interrogated him, he said that he believed in geocentrism and wouldn't admit otherwise. They knew he was lieing to their face, but he refused to admit his beliefs because he wanted to be in their Church.

He didn't want to be executed for heresy! When you're arrested by a dogmatic authority, the best thing to do is to try and portray yourself as a loyal citizen. Mouthing off that the Church was fundamentally wrong about astronomy would have been a sure fire way to get himself sent to the stake! The fact that he lied to save his own skin from being flayed off is now a bad[] thing in your eyes? Your moral centre just keeps getting better and better...

j-e-f-f-e-r-s:

Hmm... allow Professor Sagan to educate you a bit.

Nothing else I can really add. Heliocrentric theory was a natural conclusion drawn from the evidence, and the fact it took so long to get going is thanks to the Church trying to quash it at every turn.

Well that was a very dramatic representation of not taking the discussion anywhere new. Thank you for not acknowlegding my point in a really stylish way.

But I don't see how a model that accurately predicted the motion of the planets to the measurable precision of the time but turned out to be not completely inaccurate was the fault of the church for believing it. Clearly, religion was the reason they believed the model they had that accurately po

Oh, touche. I bow to your merciless wit.

Except that by using such caustic wit, you're now using the same argumentative style that Galileo did. If Galileo was a douchebag, and I'm also a douchebag, for arguing in such a style, does that mean you're now a douchebag too?

Yes, now you get it! But I am not really expecting to get your agreement or approval, so whatever.

Argh! The caustic wit! It burns. IT BURNS! Douchebag behaviour! Douchebag behaviour!

That's what I doooooo... speaking of which.

based on scientific truths that we have proven!

This bullshit you keep spouting that science never proves anything is just that: bullshit!

Science does prove, it has proven, and it will continue to prove in the future

Don't say I didn't warn you, bud.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method\

In the 20th century, a hypothetico-deductive model[9] for scientific method was formulated (for a more formal discussion, see below):

1. Use your experience: Consider the problem and try to make sense of it. Look for previous explanations. If this is a new problem to you, then move to step 2.
2. Form a conjecture: When nothing else is yet known, try to state an explanation, to someone else, or to your notebook.
3. Deduce a prediction from that explanation: If you assume 2 is true, what consequences follow?
4. Test: Look for the opposite of each consequence in order to disprove 2. It is a logical error to seek 3 directly as proof of 2. This error is called affirming the consequent.[10]

Note that this method can never absolutely verify (prove the truth of) 2. It can only falsify.
(This is what Einstein meant when he said, "No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong."[14])

Claiming that science proves is a logical fallacy. Deal with it.

Pingieking:
snip

Personally, I believe spiritually it is our duty to use science to learn more about the universe.

Who says God didn't create the electron? I look at the universe, with it's sheer complexity and see it as a sign of the glory of God.

People seem to think that, for whatever reason, we aren't allowed to say anything we understand is "proof" of God, that once we know how earth is made we know but I think the opposite of that is true. God gave us minds, and what would be a better reason to do so then so we can learn, so we can be that much closer to God because we understand him.

According to Genesis, creating earth was a momentous task that took about seven "days". I fail to see how we know earth actually formed as being any less momentous. Rock, dust, earth, all being brought from across the universe, smashed together, burnt, melt, until it formed the planet that we know today. If Humans were made by a perfect God in his image, then I have to admit that it seems there is some evidence to that belief. We were formed to be adaptable, survivable, in a world where there are creatures a thousand times faster, stronger, and larger then us, we were the ones who conquered this planet, thanks in part to our ability to adapt, to evolve, and to survive any single problem nature has thrown at us.

We would not be made in the image of a God, if we could not survive so much tragedy, and learn so much about the universe in such a short amount of time of our species' existence.

Blablahb:

tstorm823:
In the 20th century, a hypothetico-deductive model[9] for scientific method was formulated (for a more formal discussion, see below):

1. Use your experience: Consider the problem and try to make sense of it. Look for previous explanations. If this is a new problem to you, then move to step 2.
2. Form a conjecture: When nothing else is yet known, try to state an explanation, to someone else, or to your notebook.
3. Deduce a prediction from that explanation: If you assume 2 is true, what consequences follow?
4. Test: Look for the opposite of each consequence in order to disprove 2. It is a logical error to seek 3 directly as proof of 2. This error is called affirming the consequent.[10]

Note that this method can never absolutely verify (prove the truth of) 2. It can only falsify.
(This is what Einstein meant when he said, "No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong."[14])

Claiming that science proves is a logical fallacy. Deal with it.

Except that only applies to physics and only in the rigid old fashioned logical-positivism, which nobody uses anymore.

Science can prove things, and establishing them with almost-proof is certainly as good as long as there's nothing contradicting it.

Pretty much this. I can't be arsed to type out yet another response, when this perfectly sums it up. The philosophy of science is an interesting topic, but it's a largely abstract affair removed from the reality of the daily world, and has little practical applications.

The combustion engine, on the other hand, has plenty of practical applications. And that is a result of science.

Why I continue to debate with someone who repeatedly sides with the Inquisition in their decision to try Galileo for heresy... even the majority of Christians just accept that it was a monumental fuck up, and try to move on. I don't think I've ever met anyone so committed to trying to justify the Church stamping down on scientific progress.

Witty Name Here:

Who says God didn't create the electron? I look at the universe, with it's sheer complexity and see it as a sign of the glory of God.

And this is what I mean about the convergence of theists and atheists. You see it and say it's a sign of the glory of God. I see it and say it's a sign of the glory of random chance. Functionally there is no difference between these two positions.

Though I do object to the term "duty" to be used with science. Only for personal reasons, because I find anything that I have to do to be a lot less fun.

Mr.Mattress:

3: It still shows that Religion is and has been capable of good things; including the arts.

Capable of inspiring art. Usually through funding the arts. With money acquired through exploitation of the masses.

tstorm823:

In the 20th century, a hypothetico-deductive model[9] for scientific method was formulated (for a more formal discussion, see below):

1. Use your experience: Consider the problem and try to make sense of it. Look for previous explanations. If this is a new problem to you, then move to step 2.
2. Form a conjecture: When nothing else is yet known, try to state an explanation, to someone else, or to your notebook.
3. Deduce a prediction from that explanation: If you assume 2 is true, what consequences follow?
4. Test: Look for the opposite of each consequence in order to disprove 2. It is a logical error to seek 3 directly as proof of 2. This error is called affirming the consequent.[10]

Note that this method can never absolutely verify (prove the truth of) 2. It can only falsify.
(This is what Einstein meant when he said, "No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong."[14])

Claiming that science proves is a logical fallacy. Deal with it.

The quote is correct. The scientific method is only correctly applied when trying to disprove a hypothesis. Our physical laws can never be proven. But we've never experienced an exception to any of them or they wouldn't be laws.

However, performing a dissection on a child will give you access to his stomach and prove that he did ingest your cookie.